[englishwhistler]

I have recently bought a Panasonic E55.

I want to connect the VCR (only 1 scart socket) to it to record onto DVD some recordings I have made on videotape.

I have a NTL digibox and want to connect this as well which I have done but I have had a problem as I can't watch anything on the NTL box whilst recording anything on the DVD recorder on terrestrial tv via the aerial.

My TV has two Scart sockets. AV1 to the DVD Recorder. The second scart socket is split for the Video Recorder, PS2 and GameCube.

I have connected my NTL box to the DVD recorder 2nd scart socket (AV2).

I have connected my DVD player to the AV4 In of the DVD Recorder.

I got a Switchable Scart to 3 Phono/RCA (RGB?) Lead as I want to connect the VCR to the DVD recorder via the AV3 socket (on the front of the recorder). Is this right?

Anyway, I hope something can answer the following questions:

a) How do I get the DVD recorder to record via the TV aerial and watch programmes on the NTL digibox at the same time? I can do it the other way round.

b) Is connecting the VCR using the RGB / Scart cable the best way around the problem I have?

Many thanks for your time and to anyone who can help.
Paul

[JB]

I have a similar setup but I have a Toshiba RDXS32 and no additional DVD player.
Have you connected your aerial to the RF input on the DVD recorder ?
RF out from the TV to the recorder ?

[englishwhistler]

Yes I have. I followed the guidance in the manual to do the aerial into the "RF In" of the DVD Recorder and the "RF Out" of the Recorder to the "RF In" on the television.

I used to be able to get the cable box picture through a normal TV channel and get a better sharper picture on AV1 of the telly. Would now assume because I have changed the scart layout that this is not the case anymore but still cant get around watching cable while recording terrestrial on the DVD recorder.

Thanks.

[JB]

Ok I understand better now.

I have channel 8 on my TV pointing at at AV1 which is the SCART that I have connected to my NTL box. This is what you want and presumably had before.
What you need to do is connect the sceond SCART on your NTL STB to your SCART splitter. This may mean dropping one of the existing devices if you have not got enough connections.
If you only want transfer existing tapes from your VCR to the DVD Recorder then the VCR is the candidate for this.
As you mentioned in your orginal post you can use you can use the input jacks on the front of the DVD recorder to connect to your VCR.

[englishwhistler]

Is there any way the VCR can be connected to record off the NTL box (or TV aerial) and the DVD Recorder can be used to record the NTL box (or TV aerial) at the same time?

Would I have to use a cable between the NTL box and VCR (the same as if I didn't have a DVD Recorder in the first place)?

[JB]

You can run the aerial from the RF out on your DVD recorder to the VCR and tune the analog tuner in the VCR to the available channels. If your VCR uses on screen display for setting up recordings then you will have to choose your DVD recorder channel on your TV and have your your DVD recorder set to the phono jack input to see the recording setup details.
You cannot record from NTL on your VCR because it has no connection to your NTL STB.
Each device only has two scarts so you would have to introduce a scart switch to get the NTL STB to connect to the TV, DVD recorder and VCR.

The only reason I can see to do what you want is if you want to record two different programs simultaneously. One from NTL and one off the aerial.

[englishwhistler]

Yes, I might want to record two diff channels on the VCR and DVD Recorder but not worth the hassle of using a Scart Switch and having to change each time.

Would I be able to watch NTL if recording from the aerial on the DVD recorder using the connection/s above?

[englishwhistler]

It works - fantastic.
Thanks for the help.